Is there anywhere in the civilized world where vampires are legal? I was thinking of them setting up in the entertainment industry. Even a 'district' for them, clubs, bars, joy boys and girls (cold flesh) but do not know if any nations support them legally. Of course legal does not stop hunters, groupies wanna bees etc.

I'm also completely unsure. The only thing I have heard in reference was connected to the Ordo Maximus. I believe it was a Vampire initiatory group/secret society in the UK. But the name escapes me.

Of course, I could be completely wrong.

That ghoul nation in Africa. Aren't they ok with fellow infected as long as they aren't the crazy murder everyone and sort them out later type?

I was thinking some nice place in say, Toronto, Vancouver, Belgium.

IIRC PCC will issue SINs to the infected.

Running Wild lists Amazonia, Asamando, Aztlan, California, Czechia, Basque Country, France, Philippines, Salish-Shidhe and Yakut as "infected-friendly", whatever that means.

And Belgium no longer exists in SR : Wallonia joined France, Flanders joined the Netherlands, and Brussels remains as an autonomous city.

Nothing in Romania?

According to Running Wild that's Amazonia, Aztlan, Asamondo, CalFree, Czech Republic, Euskal Herraia/Basque Country, France, Greece, the SSC, Yakut (Also Evo, Aztechnology and some AA corps). Of course, 'legal' mostly means 'can get a criminal SIN and a tracker so we can watch them die because eating someone's soul is manslaughter', except for maybe Amazonia, Asamondo and to a degree some of the corps (thogh that's conjecture really).

Edit: Ninja'd by Nath.

There was that coven in KaGe who operated a poser gang and a nightclub for food, then there's JetBlack and his gang, and the seeekrit societies like Tamanous and the Ordo. Leipzig has a vibrant goth/vampire poser scene that has some vampires, and the bunches of Nosferati in Germany who run this law firm and a bunch of investment companies. Overall, though, the Vampires in Shadowrun ike their masquerade. Probably for their better, because they aren't as durable as they may think they are. SR's rules are quite deadly.


It doesn't really exist either, it's a blank spot since Synner's HDD crashed and took his writeup of Eastern Europe with it. Do what you want there. Personally, I'd be inclined to have the place run by vampires. Secretly, of course. Masquerade is a good idea in a world where all it takes is an angry mage with binoculars.

Toronto is a nice place?

...

Sorry, my Northerner is showing.

That's it! You cocky cock! You'll pay for your crimes against humanity!

Well, it is better then Montreal, at least...

Debatable. Montreal might be nicer if it wasn't for the Language Police in their Jackboots.

It's nicer than Quebec City, I'll give Toronto that. And probably just that. (Sorry, a Canadian thing, especially for Northern Ontarians.).

Shadowrun: always more reasons not to go to Africa.

That would be my number one advice for fledgling runners. Do not, for any reason, go to Africa. Ever. I mean it.




Scott Pilgrim reference, here? whaaaaaaa?

Still plenty of reason to want to from Africa (and never wanting to go back).

Tell it to the cleaning lady on Monday.

It's not as bad as Quebec.

Azania's not so bad as a setting (there's worse parts in the UCAS, not to mention Europe). Besides, I'm kind of tired of the authors in the CGL era painting every African location as a variation of a recent African Hellhole. All race issues/allegations aside, that's just wasting a setting with a lot of potential. You could, for instance, do interesting things with Benin - if you have played Empire: Total War with an Amazon edition gam, you should have a good idea. Or maybe Ethiopia, which has the added bonus of being a hotbed of bizarre iterations of Judaism and Christianity and potential magical hotspots.

You could do quite a lot of things with Africa in Shadowrun. Instead, the entire continent is declared "here be [the correct term is 'people of colour', hermit]s!'. And that's a shame.

Thanks for bringing it back to topic hermit.

You mean that little light on the horizon that barely registers to the augmented eye?

Seriously, though, yeah, their are plenty of nations that will allow infected to live there, and a few Megas that will pay them, but as with any deseased individual, or someone that is known for violence for any reason, most people generally won't accept them "...in my neighbourhood."

Aztechnology, as someone has mentioned, will employ infected, especially Ghouls and Loup-Garou, but I'm remembering something about them not doing it openly. And how it seemed a little off, since they are trying to appear to be much more humanitarian these days.

OP got her question answered. Twice. So it's not like I am preventing that.

Why anyone would want to employ Loup-Garou, of all things, is beyond me (even Mutaqua make more sense), but the Infected have been whitewashed, declawed and painted pink in 4E anyway.


Yeah, carpet bombing cities is very humanitarian ...

I would assume people would in general oppose to have raving mad flesh-eating zombie disease spreading monsters for co-workers. Loup-Garou might make decent beastman-style shock trops, but there's hardly any other use for them I can see.

There, back on topic enough?

Depends, are the areas they're carpet bombing have any SINners broadcasting from their Commlinks?

If not, then it's just urban renewal.

I for one love Mother Africa. Maybe it's because you can get away with so much there and it's an easy place to disappear in. Plus it's not Quebec which is always a plus for you and your non metahuman brethren.

I recall somewhere that Loup-Garou are considered a lot like Ghouls. They both transmit their affliction via contact (usually biting), they both tend to transform into less-than-human acting creatures, and they can both retain some cognitive function post transformation. They both also only require an amount of metahuman flesh, not soul-draining essance. The monthly rage the Loup-garou have can be medicated away, and they tend to be relatively sane without it (relative to the big kid on the playground with no idea of right and wrong, mind you...). I've also heard mention of a Loup-garou movement similar to the Ghoul one, though not as far spread, or accepted.



Alright, you got me there. I was refering to Aztechnology's public face before Ghost Cartels. They seem to have gone very south very fast on that note. (Or just let the public see the face under the mask, which from what I hear is much more likely- I started playing in 4th edition)

Yup. And much like with Ghouls, I just cannot see anyone wanting to have them for co-workers. It's pretty bad for AIDS infected, and was much worse in the 80s, and they don't turn you into a zombie mutant and/or try to eat you given half a chance. I just do not buy this sudden cuddlyness with that kind of Infected.


... when they torched Yucatán? Okay, that's 3E, but the Azzis have been playing hardball since ever.

Aztech might be popular and produce a million billion great products, but nobody would think people who propagate bloodsport sport to be humanitarian. Nor is humanitarianism very high in demand in the Shadowrun world, excpet where Horizon is concerned.

Which makes Horizon even more suspicious than AZT. If that were even possible.

Trying to fix that. I had a few ideas, but got involved with things a bit late. Okay, more than a bit late, but Rob didn't listen to me about the critters back in the initial 4E playtests anyway, and it was his decision-making that deballed the Infected from the word "Go."

But I'm working on it. Slowly, since that's how I work and I've got a lot of things to undo, but I am working on it.

I address that, at least a little, in Street Legends. I'm not too wild about "Infected rights" either.

The fact that a ghouls sneezes in your general direction and you get to be his brother if you were not extremely prepared does not help either . .

You ain't just whistling "Dixie" there....

does not compute?

I believe he's agreeing that is a bad set up

Eh, Shadowrun (and cyberpunk in general) is a world were there majority population lives like workers in the early days of industrialization - and that's before you get to the trogs or everybody else who doesn't fit. So giving rights to Infected is not about luxury problems like non-segregated bathrooms or equal opportunity employment, because that's something the rest of the world doesn't have, either. It's about basic things like not having a price one's head by virtue of existing.

And that is why drones are your friends.

Good old Martin.


Yeah (and Ancient's writeup of the near-veggie Wendigo that totally dismisses the core concept of the Wendigo legend). Your writeup has been more along the lines of what I think the Infected should be like. I still think it's a mistake to make them playable characters, too (and not much more plausible creatures, like Merrows). Or at least give some ideas about special campaigns for special needs PC in the Companion ... ah well, let'S not dwell on the companion to much, it'll just get me in rant mode.


Cyberpunk also is a world where a much more feral idea of justice exists, in essence a neofeudal society. So why exactly shuld the general, unwashed and impoverished population hug and protect ghouls and vamps who are out to eat them instead of burning them at the stake? Why should a corp risk their wage-slaves turning on them because of politically correct embracing of the Infected?

Leper colony-like solutions might be possible, like shipping Infected to some kind of leper colony island. Of course, given Yomi, that idea probably is heavily tainted in the SR world.

At least the vampires don't sparkle.

Yet.

I've never gotten the "rights" for infected, either. They aren't some misunderstood minority, they eat people. And the infectiousness of ghouls (part of Running Wild that I really think they need to retcon back to what it was) makes embracing them even more inexplicable. They are highly infectious, with a disease that turns people into, more or less, zombies - feral flesh-eating, rotted-looking things.


A district for vampires, I think is a very bad idea. You'll wind up having vampire carnivals, and vampire strip clubs, then you'll have Mary Sue, the PC vampire hunter, getting her own harem of vampires and shapeshifters. Don't go there... that way lies madness.

But on the plus side: Salma Hayek stripping...

ah, thank you for the translation ^^
i can do english, i can do bad english . . but i never got the hang of redneck! *runs*

You know, I could just C&P my previous statement under that...but I will try to make it a bit more understandable:
Civil rights in Shadowrun are not about not being discriminated and ostracized, but about not being shot on sight.

So, basicly it is about not being open, total warfare? Then shooting them where they can't be seen in the shadows is not off the table.

It's one of the rules: "Be discrete."

No, wait, that's "Be polite."

But you should also have a plan to kill everyone you meet.

For ghouls, the plan is: breathe.

Well, shooting people in the shadows is what this game is about

With Companion's race generation rules that's actually an easy build. The Cold Ones (yes, I did that once) even came in less expensive than Nosferati.


Any SR4 book disagrees with you on that. Actually, even SR2's Sprawl Sites disagrees (check the ORC activist contact and a couple of the encounters). The only book that might agree with you is Germany Sourcebook.

Actually, although it detracts from the aforementioned, I prefer that writeup. I always had a problem with the earlier "Monster Manual" style writeup of the wendigo (and the SR3 metavariants, especially dryads). If you are going to have wendigos and dryads more closely resembling their legends, then do them as spirits, so it makes more sense! It's way better than saying "Human vampires can occasionally be angsty and misunderstood, but all orks that are infected are automatically chaotic evil, and all exhibit a very specific pattern of behavior." Or "Dryads all have a mysterious urge to go to the middle of the woods. Oh yeah, and they all automatically have the same religion." Metavariants and sapient critters have no business being pigeonholed into narrow roles like that. To some extent you can justify it if it is something present only in an isolated enclave, with one culture, but usually it smacks of lazy writing to me.


The biggest problem with that setup is that they still need "food". Of course, if you have some other kind of undesirable that can act in that role, you can essentially solve two problems at once. I don't see that happening in the public eye, even in the jaded world of Shadowrun, but I can see a government or megacorporation doing it secretly. Especially if it is combined with HMHVV research.

Ghouls (and Type III beasts) can eat the dead of SINless and each other if there're too many of them. The Vamps and other souleaters have no business being alive anyway. I can't possibly see why those should be allowed to be left alive.


Because it is so much more logical to pigeonhole spirits (which are just as playable as metavariants and sapients) into an alignment - which are a bullshit idea to begin with, so best leave them out of this. Besides, the original setup had the vamps be just as evil as wendigos, only wendigos adding that "prefers the meat of people it corrupts to cannibalism" feat.

The dryad writeup was that of a Fae, though. Which are spirits, more or less. Pretty strange to make it an elf variant, of course.

It depends if you consider spirits to be sapient independent creatures, or manifestations of cosmic forces shaped by belief.

Even the in-game magical theorists haven't figured that one out for sure.

A Wendigo spirit, for example, may be a bloodthirsty savage man-eating horror because that's what people believe it to be.





-k

They're playable. Unless you want to say every player of a spirit is maybe not an independent creature, it's fair to assume they are, since the rules for playing one do not indicate otherwise.

Nevermind how much that fucks fluff over and how much that screws with the way the SR world works. Background-wise, I'm all with you there, but Rob Boyle decided to make SR4 the newD&D where you can play anything that can hold a sword, so there you go. Of course, even UMT and SR4's magic syystem massively fucks with the established canon of how magic works in SR's universe ("your beliefs shape the rules"), so that is a pattern with SR4.


Yeah, and look a lot mor awesome than that X-Men character. Did that once, was quite a memorable experience for some layers. But anyway. Making the Wendigo non.corrupting is the same level of gimping and PCing as a sparkling, vegetarian vampire would be.

On what? That everybody who is not a mid-level corp employee has the same enforceable rights as pre-Civil Rights blacks (i.e. none when it matters), or that "Ghoul rights" doesn't mean giving them more rights than the other proles?

Either way, I'm sure you have a quote to back that up.

I consider spirits to be semi-sapient to sapient beings formed from the manasphere, shaped by the collective consciousness of metahumanity as a whole. So I think it does make sense to have them in more specific roles - the Wild Hunt is an example. I don't think of it as "alignment" so much as "programming". To use the matrix as an analogy, I would say most hermetic spirits are similar to agents, shamanic spirits are similar to sprites, and free spirits are similar to AIs. Although I also think the higher Force spirits will usually have more sapience, and more of a unique personality, even for things such as elementals.

Of course, this is getting into personal interpretation territory, but things such as manitou, the Wild Hunt, and other things show that spirits can have more rigidly defined behaviors and roles, when those roles are associated with a particular myth or legend.